French jobless total still rising

France’s unemployment rate has risen again, with the picture particularly bleak for young people.

That underlines the scale of the challenge facing President Francois Hollande, who took over in May as the country’s first Socialist president in 17 years.

He has promised to reverse the upward trend by the end of next year.

Using International Labour Organisation measurements, the jobless total reached 10.3 percent of the workforce in the third quarter of this year.

The rise in youth unemployment was more marked, hitting 24.9 percent.

Those figures include French overseas territories such as the Caribbean islands of Martinique and Guadeloupe.

The tally is marginally better for just the French mainland, but still up on the previous quarter at 9.9 percent.

Hollande’s government is struggling in the face of major job losses in industry, while it is having to slash public spending and raises taxes to reduce debt, even as Europe’s second largest economy stagnates.